The subject application is directed generally to detection of faces in electronic image data. The application is particularly applicable to verification of detected facial regions resultant from testing performed by other systems.
Electronic images are captured from many sources, including digital still cameras, digital motion cameras, or scanned photographs. It is often desirable to determine whether human faces are present in such images. By way of example, security cameras may be used to determine if humans are present. More sophisticated systems may even identify which humans are present in an image. Applications exist in areas such as building security and airport security. Isolation of facial portions allows such portions to be analyzed more quickly so as to establish the identity of an individual or to create a tangible record showing which individuals may have been present at a given time. Still other applications allow for adjustment or correction of images in a manner designed to maximize facial characteristics. Application of such modification on non-face images may result in a distorted image or in a waste of resources due to unneeded processing.
Many techniques exist to isolate faces in electronic images. Such techniques include looking for relative positions of facial characteristics such as eyes, nose, or mouth. Many such techniques will return a positive indication when a face is detected and will isolate an area believed to contain such facial characteristics.
While image detection is continually improving, it is still less than optimal. Sometimes, positive hits are returned that identify a non-existent face. Other times, a face is missed. Still other times, only a portion of an identified face is isolated. Misidentified facial regions can result in a breach of security, missed identification, or processing or archiving of unneeded data. Human verification, while reliable, is both costly and time consuming.